A view of strategy, procurement, warships, navies, and world politics. please note its all my work - information may come from elsewhere, and certainly the pictures do, but the analysis is mine, so any flak about it; address it to me, any praise likewise.
I have no problem with defending by debate or being corrected when I am wrong. I hope to someday get some of the ideas published, so any feed back will be of great and most profound assistance.

Tuesday, 1 October 2013

September 2013 Thoughts: The Armed Forces and the Numbers Game

In 1982 the
British Armed Force had over 327,000 personnel in service from which to man a
Task Force to reclaim the Falkland’s; the defence budget was 5.95% of GDP and
equated to £120,849 being spent per service-member[1].
However, as of August 2013 the armed forces of the UK are 157,680[2]
and is being rapidly reduced by further cuts, the defence budget is 2.14%
(including research[3])
equating to £214,358 per service-member[4].
So whilst the percentage of GDP spend is down by more than 50%, and the numbers
are down by more than 50%; the British government is spending 77% more per
service-member – therefore it follows those personnel must be the best equipped
that Britain has ever fielded and there should be no shortages of equipment?
Unfortunately it hasn’t worked like that, shortages are all too common theme of
operations and of embarrassing press articles[5]
which have plagued successive governments. The question is why?

Why do the
British public not accept being told that a faster/better police car/fire
engine/ambulance can cover more ground than previous types so we need fewer
without organising protests, marches and online petitions running into the
thousands – but on the just as important topic of defence accept such arguments
with barely a murmur? Yes the Eurofighter & F-35 are better than a Tornado
or a Harrier; the Queen Elizabeth carriers
and Daring destroyers are better
than the Invincibles and Type 42s
of the Falklands era[6];
none of them can be in two places at once though. Furthermore, better also usually
means more complicated, not just in terms of mechanics but in terms of the far
more confounding computers and programing – making maintenance and possible
problems require more specialist skills, making it more difficult.

The total list
of programs and equipment which have been cut without replacements is massive[7],
Britain has sacrificed Long Range Maritime Patrol (LRMP) and like the Type 22
Frigates instead of the equipment being put into storage or handed over to the
reservists so it would be accessible when needed it was destroyed. Practically
brand new multi-million pound investments wiped out without even seemingly a
glance. The Army has also suffered although its pain has been masked to an
extent by the procurement of equipment for the Counter Insurgency (COIN) wars
it has been fighting in Afghanistan and Iraq – but now there’s talk of using
that equipment for years to come in possibly, ‘peer war’ scenarios; a Cougar or
Jackal is great for protecting troops from IEDs and mines, but what about
artillery fire/air attack, direct fire from a tank/IFV or an anti-tank missile?
The result will not be something any government wants to see (and certainly no
amount of blaming the predecessors will wash it’s record clean); yet still cuts
to defence are considered the soft option of British politics, with even now
reports appearing that further cuts are a very real possibility[8]. These
cuts though are not because the British political class are anti-national security;
but because the NHS (£124.4billion), Education (£87.3billion),
Pensions(£139.1billion), Welfare (£116.6billion) and even servicing the
interest on Britain Debts (£47.2billion) have a higher priority given to them
by the national political debate[9]. The
concentration for this piece though is on defence, but it is of limited length,
so it seems sensible to concentrate on just one problem, for one service to
provide an example of situation that has arisen.

What’s
happened to the nation which demanded “we
want eight” when faced with the Naval Race of the early 20th
century? Why is Britain as a trend disarming by technology? Certain numbers of
personnel are required; certain equipment is required to deploy – one of the
most interesting facets of this trend is that Strategic Deterrent, the supreme
example of technological security is understood to require certain numbers to
guarantee it’s at sea readiness (which itself is a cornerstone of it’s ability
to act). However, in the same breath as voices declare that, they will declare
that two aircraft carriers can replace four (over worked) aviation ships; the
Royal Navy to maintain the Strategic Deterrent has to guarantee one vessel on
patrol, for this four vessels are the minimum[10]. Yet
according to those voices to provide both the aviation ship for Carrier
Strike/Fleet Air Defence and the aviation ship for the Amphibious Lift/Close
Air Support just two are needed? This is a future problem though (which could
be easily solved by the construction of 1 LHA & 2 LHDs[11])
and even then it’s not even the most glaringly problematic one. At the current
time the RN has to provide escorts for the Response Force Task Group (2+), the
Fleet Read Escort (1), Atlantic Patrol Task – North (1), Atlantic Patrol Task –
South (1), Combined Task Force 150 & 151, NATO Response Force (1) and other
East of Suez patrols – even if all those not numbered just required 1 vessel,
the RN would need an escort strength of 24 vessels, with no slack to maintain
those 8 on station. It has just 19. Hence, it’s unsurprising that in a recent
speech the new First Sea Lord stated[12]:

In the Royal Navy, we cross-connect the use of the entire frigate and
destroyer force - and we have to, because of numbers - and to maximise output.
In doing so, we move seamlessly from training on operations, to operations. We
move from a high end role, to a simpler mission, and back again. And, at all
times, high end training is necessary, on the right equipment, to be ready.

We allocate ships to more than one task, by double and triple counting -
because we have to. And we work the crews very hard to make this 'ship
chemistry' work.

This is the
famous RN can-do attitude at work, but triple counting a ship is an accountancy
bluff which only works because it’s not called – not a safe strategic choice
for a nation which is as exposed and interconnected globally as the UK is[13].
For example, if the 3 Type 23 frigates had not been sold by the government of Tony
Blair to Chile[14]
and if Gordon Brown’s government had kept to the letter of the 2003 Defence
White Paper, Delivering Security in a
Changing World, 8 Type 45s would have been built[15];
so the Royal Navy even if the Coalition had still cut the Type 22 frigates[16]
would have had the 24 escorts in service. As it is a successive governments
have cut numbers, in a penny pinching fashion without strategy or evening seemingly considering operations. Would it not have been
better to sell Chile Type 22s rather than cut a class which was the back bone
of the fleet in numbers even then; and to which the figure of 16 does not represent that
much larger an operating cost than 13? Why not build the 7th and 8th
Type 45s? If six are being built, they are replacing 12 ships, and it will reduce the cost per unit of the class as the research had already been done and paid for; again the running
cost would not have been that much more for a large operation benefit. The Type
22s, are to an extent harder to defend as they were a small class in a force looking for
savings; but they could have been made reserve vessels[17] -
for which their size and form/equipment would have made them perfect candidates.
Then if necessary the government could have called upon one or two from time to
time in peace time to fill in for vessels needed elsewhere or damaged by
accident[18];
or even to provide extra escorts for major exercises like Cougar 13[19] –
options which would have been great for reservist capability and moral. Instead
the RN is on 19 escorts and has no reserve[20] -
no tactical, no strategic reserve; there are no reserve ships for the RN.

Britain is
a nation which depends upon energy and food imports, which depends upon
exports and the free movement of goods to be able to pay for that. Britain is a
nation with many friends, many dependents and many interests. Britain is a
nation which depends upon a level of global stability to be profitable. Britain
is a nation that’s largest ally is starting to focus on another ocean. Escorts
can no longer be coasted upon and reduced, without thinking through the
strategy. This though won’t happen if defence continues to be an issue which
suffers either being ignored, wilfully ignorant or ignominious considerations –
such as focus upon jobs a certain program/procurement creates rather than what
it delivers in terms of security. How will this happen, well not by passing a
law that it must be debated or by having another day set aside a year. It has
to be the responsibility who is interested, who realises the problem to instead
of sitting at home grumbling to their family in front of the news, to everyone
who when reading the papers shudders when seeing the words “Britain must act” whilst thinking “with what?”; in fact to everyone. Silence can no longer be
tolerated, at minimum tweet, blog, write letters to the press or to your local
MP; raise the issue at every opportunity – because it is only when the illumination
of a thorough debate is cast upon this issue that change for the better could
ever come about.

[20] In an ideal world the RN would have 16 Type 23s and 8
Type 45s in regular and 4-6 Type 22s in reserve; an escort force of 28-30 vessels,
that would have had sufficient a combination of flexibility and capability
built in to adapt to any strategic scenario Britain was likely to find itself
in.